St. Vincent girls pull away to easy NCL II win

Tomales’ six-girl basketball team hangs with St. Vincent for a quarter before the Lady Mustangs take charge.|

Outnumbered, outgunned and out-experienced, the Tomales girls hung with rival St. Vincent as long as they could Tuesday night. That was for one quarter, before St. Vincent exerted its dominance and romped to a 48-25 victory.

The game started promisingly enough for the six-girl Tomales team, with Isabel Sartori driving for the game’s first basket.

Sartori later banked home a 3-pointer and Natty Feliciano hit a short shot as the Lady Braves stayed with the cold-shooting Lady Mustangs through the first period in St. Vincent’s DeCarli gym. At the first break, St. Vincent led 8-7.

Feliciano, who hit 6-of-10 free throws and scored eight points in the game, dropped in a couple more freebees to keep the Lady Braves within two at 12-10 midway through the second round, but sophomore Alessandra Ditzio nailed a 3-pointer for St. Vincent and the lid was lifted from the Lady Mustang basket.

While Tomales struggled just to get off a shot, St. Vincent charged for 18 unanswered points to turn the game into a 33-10 rout by halftime. Ditzio with 10 points, Sophia Licata with 4-for-4 free-throw shooting and Julia Murphy with the final five points of the half, led the surge.

Tomales had only three free throws in the second period.

With just one substitute and two girls playing with four fouls each, Tomales had no chance to mount a second-half comeback.

St. Vincent coach Shannon Carroll rotated players in freely over the final two periods as the Lady Braves struggled to find ways to slow the fast-galloping Lady Mustangs.

Led by a 3-point hit and five points from Isabel Sartori, Tomales managed 10 points in the fourth period, but by then, the Lady Mustangs were out of the barn and romping to victory.

Ditzio, although she, like all the Mustangs, spent considerable time off the floor, led St. Vincent with 15 points and also pulled down seven rebounds and blocked five Tomales shots. Murphy scored nine points and grabbed seven rebounds for the board-dominant Lady Mustangs.

Last week

St. Vincent split a pair of NCL II games last week, losing to Sonoma Academy’s wild-running Coyotes, 43-24, but dominating Technology’s Titans, 51-5.

Sonoma Academy’s tenacious defense was too much for St. Vincent, holding the Lady Mustangs to single-digit scoring in every quarter.

Ditzio accounted for almost half the St. Vincent, scoring with 10 points.

Everyone got in on the happiness in the romp over Technology with 11 Lady Mustangs scoring.

Alexandra Saisi led St. Vincent with 10 points, but there were a lot of other contributors. Clare Galten scored two points, Shelby Murphy two, Julia Murphy six, Ditzio four, Sully Henry six, Lauren Vollert three, Grace Pedersen two, Sophia Licata eight, Ajyssa Smith two and Olivia Badaglia six.

Tomales was no match for Rincon Valley Christian in its league opener, losing, 54-17.

St. Vincent is now 3-6 on the season and 2-1 in North Central League II play, while Tomales is 5-3 on the season, but 0-2 in league play.

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